How to Make Chewy, Tender Pita Bread (with Pockets Every Single Time)
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- Опубликовано: 17 апр 2021
- Test cook Erin McMurrer shows host Bridget Lancaster how to make Pita Bread.
Get the recipe for Pita Bread: cooks.io/39hZus7
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I am so happy I found this recipe because I have failed many times in the past with “no pocket” pita bread. Now, my pita has big pockets and is soft, chewy, and scrumptious. Thanks so much, ATK!
I just want to know who has enough room in their fridge for a baking tray? Lol
I love the fact that this recipe is so different from other pita recipes I’ve seen! A lot more time but intriguing.
This recipe made my mouth water so it has my official seal of approval 👍🏻🤤
If you don’t, you can always use two quarter sheets. Those fit in my little mini fridge 🤷🏻♀️
The best recipe so far for pita bread that tastes like heaven. I started to make bread when covid-19 started. I love pita bread like any other Middle Eastern person. I tried 6 or 7 recipes, all of which were OK, but this is more than OK. The taste, not just the texture, is much better; it is like a cookie. I think it is the slow fermentation process because of the ice-cold water and the placement in the fridge for 17 hours.
Thank you for sharing. This is the first recipe I use from America's Test Kitchen.
I fell upon this tnight…..FYI, NO middle easterners uses King whatever flour, ice water or refrigerate our dough! Yea right……and we only make the original pita bread. The western world always believe they know it all……..
That is the best tutorial for making a pita I have seen and I really wish I had watched about two years ago. It would have saved me a whole lot of misery. Hopefully by next weekend I will be able to have a real pita to make a lamb sandwich. Thank you for showing me a better way to make a pita.
As good as these seem, the absolute best pita recipe I have ever tried is from Chef John over at Foodwishes. No need for a long fermentation or even an oven as they are cooked on the stove top in a cast iron skillet. ruclips.net/video/NPiA69p4gqE/видео.html&ab_channel=FoodWishes
I was waiting for Bridgette to say, after rolling out the first one, now we re-pita the process.
A missed opportunity!
Hilarious, take that one to the bank!
Groooan, that's awful, thankyou.
That would be a Chef John kinda think to say :)
Hahaha
Metric measurements and baker's percentages:
416g bead flour (100%)
7g instant dry yeast (1.7%)
298g water (71.6%)
28g honey (6.7%)
53g olive oil (12.7%)
5g salt (1.2%)
ATK!! Please oh please at least give the metric measurements as well for the bread bakers! .. It's laudable that you encourage weighing ingredients, but utterly laughable that you then use extremely 'inaccurate' ounces, cups and teaspoons!! .. When the scales you recommend measure in grams, and provides ounces in decimal places and not fractions!!!! .. Btw .. please get it right .. instant yeast fermentation barely contributes to flavor development. It's principal function is to produce lots of gas .. Also, salt doesn't "inhibit gluten formation" .. if anything, it regulates/moderates yeast activity, which is what you claim to be looking for, so best to include with the dry ingredients .. "Autolyse" involves just flour and water, as a method of hydrating the flour, kickstarting gluten development and conversion of starch into sugars, and creating extensibility in the dough .. the adding of olive oil creates a smoother textured crumb, but inhibits gluten development .. Good for nice soft pita breads, but the opposite of what you claim your were trying to achieve by delaying the salt .. . For that smoother more extensible dough that will produce a nicely puffed pita, without the need for an overnight retard, better to first do a regular autolyse (flour + 90% of the water) for 30-60 mins, then mix in the remaining water and ingredients .. and add a bit more salt for more flavor .. 8g (1.9%) should be enough ..
I 1,000% agree with everything you said here. Sounds like you and Dan need to get together and possibly tweak this recipe a little. Your comments about the salt are new to me. I went through a culinary program and baking was included, but I was always taught that adding the salt too early in Auto lease would inhibit the gluten development, not encourage it. I don't think the average viewer of ATK is quite ready to grasp the concept of Baker's percentages, and I'm not really sure if it matters all that much anyway, if you aren't running your own bakery. If you want to make 16 pitas or four pitas or even two pitas, just divide or multiply accordingly. But I couldn't agree more that America's Test Kitchen needs to be using and encouraging metric measurements when baking, as it is far more accurate and much simpler to grasp.
Not everyone makes a ton of different breads at home and so no one is comparing the weight differences of honey or salt to other styles of bread... ie most people don't want "baker's" percentages. For everything other than the flour, volume measurements are easier, and for heavier ingredients, oz are a better measurement as they have simpler "significant digits". It's all about tolerances - and in this case those tolerances would be completely lost if the ingredients were weighed in metric or we ignored the volume measurements.
Instant yeast ABSOLUTELY contributes to flavor development. Fermenting cold vs fermenting hot will have completely different flavor profiles. Many beer styles, for example, are completely defined by how the the brewer decides to develop the yeast.
Thank you SO much for doing the bakers’ percentages for this! I knew I wanted around 20 of these pitas but using your percentages and starting with 1000g of flour made it SO MUCH easier! It ends up being 19.2 pieces (at the same 101g size indicated in the original 8 piece recipe) which is pretty perfect if you ask me.
thanks for the gram measurements mate
Thank you!!! I thought 14 2/3 oz was terrible. I like using gr.MUCH better. Overnight...naw!
What an interesting video. I love the science explanation. And how they magically separate like that is incredible!!!!!
I was surprised at the amount of kitchen science there is when making proper pita bread with pockets. Thank you!.
You guys are so awsome for helping us to bring up our cooking skills,
Made the best pita bread I've ever had using this recipe! Thank you!
Amazing ...wow...thanks
This looks amazing !
and something I will likely never make....unless time is no object
Beautiful.
Super Baker , perfect Bread. Good Job.
Supermarket pita bread usually do lack pockets, but they make great personal pizza crusts!
I've used naan and pitas. Love how crusty pitas can become.
Somebody did that in one of these videos and some Mexican people went apescat because supposedly it was Americans disrespecting Mexican culture. Again!!!
Supermarket pita is made for personal pizza!
@@juansierra5704 how is using a Mediterranean/Middle Eastern bread for the base of an Italian recipe related to Mexican culture? Did you mean Italian?
I live in Montreal and most supermarket pita here is excellent quality. And ATK needs to understand that not all pita are meant to have pockets, pitas that are meant to be used as wraps are generally thinner and pocket free.
As a 22 year fan of the show I'd like to thank them for teaching me so much.
The largest problem I have other than the cost and availability of ingredients that most small towns can't come close to providing, Is measurements in ounces.
14 and 2/3 ounces? I'm always confused my scale reads and ounces but not it's not the fancy read out like the show uses in 2/3 for example , If that is point what?.I Please oh please girls give us give us measurements in grams I love your cookbooks but but none of them ever use grams for measurement.
I know we Americans aren't metric smart. Most bakers are. Please help us ou
Nothing better than measuring in grams.
Google is your friend, my friend.
I came here to say this....but also why not weigh ALL ingredients? grams of salt, yeast, olive oil, etc? America can handle grams, Bridget. Also we love you.
A fraction is a division equation. To get the decimal equivalent, divide the numerator (the "top" number) by the denominator (the "bottom" number).
Example: the fraction ⅔ is 2 divided by 3
2÷3= 0.6666666667
Any of those sixes round up to 7, so it can be .7, .67, .667, etc., as the sixes continue infinitely; 2÷3 doesn't result in an even number.
Grams would certainly be easier.
I hope this helps.
@@dawnkindnesscountsmost5991 .. for reasons it is hard to understand, ATK insists, when they actual give a weight measure, to do it in imperial versus metric. The digital scale they are using, and their recommended scale displays in 10ths of an ounce. So when they say 14 and 2/3 oz., there is an inherent opportunity for mismeasurement that is 100% mitigated if they would just use provide the metric equivalent. Minor, yes - but accuracy matters in bread baking and it is such an easy "fix" that they refuse to embrace.
The overnight ferment adds a lot of flavor that many recipes lack. High heat over 400F is also needed for a good puff, whether in the oven or on the stove. I prefer the stove, but this is a good recipe either way. I have some in the fridge right now to cook tomorrow!
Can you keep the dough in the freezer ?
Thank you for the tutorial and the insights. Unfortunately, I don't have all the fancy kitchen equipment.
Great video.
Look perfect pita, thank you very much , I like to ask you do we have to add olive oil ? Can just skip that or just add a very little and still getting good pita?
The oil will help with softness.
If one really wants a cold dough preparation, it is imperative that the massive glass bowl be chilled with ice water and then dried.
The heat of the room temperature glass bowl that weighs 5 to 10 pounds will warm the relatively small amount of cold water very quickly.
Don't believe it? Try using a thermometer to check the dough temperature after mixing. I'm definitely trying the cold dough process!
the usual metal bowl that comes with the basic kitchenaid also doesnt stay cold. my dough NEVER cleared the bowl, even after 15 minutes.
New subbie here. Can’t wait to try this recipe. Can pitas be frozen prior to baking?
Hi, Bridget ! ❤️
Yummy. If I was that patient to make them. lol.
Im not sure if anyone else ran into this problem, but Ive tried the recipe twice now and the same thing happened. When mixing for 6-8 min on medium after adding the salt, it would not form a dough ball. To fix this I slowly added 1 cup of white wheat bread flour to the mixer, and an additional 3/4 cup of white bread flour. This seemed to make a perfect sticky dough ball after about 3-5 minutes. The reason I used white wheat is because you can add less to thicken it up, plus it adds a wonderful flavor to the pita :)
I weighed water and bread flour also...way too wet.
This worked pretty well for me, but out of the 8, I only had 3 balloon up the way they were supposed. The rest got bubbles like naan, but didn't fully balloon up. Any ideas why? Didn't let it ferment long enough? Rolled it too thin? Temperature too high/low? Not enough yeast? Maybe the dough got too warm sitting on the counter while waiting for others to cook?
They say anything over 425F can make them not puff. Definitely temperatures below 400F can make them not puff. Maybe get a thermometer to measure the internal oven temperature. I make pitas in a pan on an induction burner that is 420-430F degrees. They pretty much always puff.
May have added to much flour or over kneading. Super important is cool dough and high heat to cook, needs steam for form in middle of bread to puff up. Same as doing pop overs.
Grams please! Thank you!
Julia Childs Persian Naan dough works great with this method which I learned from James Beard.
Persian Barbary bread would be nice... this is a lovely video! Thank you
Put the ice water in a pitcher with a lid so you can pour it without straining it.
I love how you advocate for weighing ingredients. But why not go all the way and advocate for weighing things in grams? Any scale that can weigh ounces can also weigh grams. Plus, no pesky fractions!
That’s what I was thinking.
There can be many reasons for giving the weight in ounces instead of grams, but one (probably minor) reason is audience expectation. Converting 14.666667 ounces to grams gives (approximately) 415.793 grams. Giving a recipe calling for 416 grams of flour isn't aesthetically pleasing. It doesn't match audience expectations and preferences for round numbers in recipes. (I also assume that bumping it to a pleasing 425 grams of flour may have thrown off the other measurements)
As for the fractions, many American bakers prefer them. As someone who will be cutting this recipe in half, the fractions generally make it easier for me to scale the recipe. While I could scale recipes using gram measurements, doing so can also introduce pesky fractions and unsightly decimals that are more difficult to work with than doing something like dividing a quarter cup in half.
Maybe, when considering the various reasons for and against, they should have used grams. But, I'm happy that they did it this way since I'm a bit selfish and this better suits my needs. It is unfortunate if it didn't suit your needs.
@@paulhamilton7854 Better yet... start with metric, and use whole numbers.
That was my 1st thought too. When she said ounces, I screamed, “WHY”? Every baker uses grams. America’s test kitchen failed in that dept.
You can’t really use metric on a show called AMERICA’S Test Kitchen! 😂
What are the measurements if one wished to use whole wheat flour? Will this recipe work with whole wheat flour? PS I’m really impressed with the outcome of your recipe. Beautiful perfect pita bread!!
If using 100% whole wheat it will be necessary to change the water amount. However you can take out a third cup of flour & replace with wheat flour and things should remain the same. I'm not expert but I've made whole wheat bread and it's different, need more water
We need a good gyro recipe!!!!
Ive done so many tests with oils. When it comes to that small amount of olive oil, myself and others can never tell the difference between olive oil and veg oil. Save the good evoo for dipping and drizzling.
ice water, try 500 grams of flour, 200 ml of milk, 1 ml of warm water, sugar, a pinch of salt and 10 g of instant yeast. sift flour, stir in milk water and yeast and sugar, let stand for 5 minutes, then knead. leave warm for an hour. divide the dough before putting it aside for half an hour. then gently flatten by hand. Let stand for 15 minutes. then 8 minutes in the pan and fry on medium heat. or 15 to 20 minutes at 200 degrees celsius. then you have real good bread
I'm always impressed with the test kitchen's recipes but couldn't help but observe that most folks who make pita at home don't use ice water (if they have it available). It happens at room temperature. I tend to go with a lower percentage of water, 55%. I think having a smooth dough is essential.
I've been baking pita bread for about 2 years, why do I have a thin side and a fluffy side? Thank you
🔥
PLEASE GO METRIC - especially for baking!
I make pita Bread with warn water and it's very easy ans perfect in my fry pan. In one hour I have 10 pita
I can count on ATK to turn a simple process into a project!
How long can you store pita bread please?😊
Lordy, do this again in grams/liters please.
thanks for the scientific explanation!
Since I would not bake 8 pita breads at one time, can this dough be frozen for later. And, if so, at what stage would they go in the freezer?
Where do you get that huge cutting board?!
Probably by mail order or William-Samona
Restaurant supply stores generally have them.
Sam's club
a simple moist dough (sticky!) will yield a fully ballooned pita when baked in the oven on a cookie sheet - its foolproof
OR, you could take a good French Bread formula, develop the dough, scale it out to the desired size of your pitas and the size of pita's you want. Flatten into the flat round pita's shape, place on a papered sheet pan, (I/2 Sheet pan fits most home ovens), and when all your pita rounds are on the pan, place right into your oven, period, No proofing, no waiting, do it immediately. You'll get pita's. I did it that way for years, caution, don't over bake. A slight brown around the edges only, other wise, you get bread crumbs waiting to be made. If I remember right, as it's been years, a hot oven, of 425 degrees is necessary for the best oven spring. Experiment on the temp. I'm getting old and the memory's not as good as it was. Scale all ingredients water weighs 1 #/pint. Hence, the old saying, "a pints a pound the world around". Works with eggs also.
Interesting, I may try your method, because I rarely have room for a sheet pan in my fridge nor can I afford to have a "stone" heating for an hour. Thanks!
Indeed any decent bread or pizza dough should work as long as it's a light yeast or no-yeast dough. 425F is a forgiving temperature. I roll out sourdough pizza dough and throw it in a 900F oven which is a lot hotter than ideal and still get a quality pita.
If I want to bake these in an Ooni pizza oven using woodfire or even gas, what would I need to change as far as temp and timing in the oven?
My third try at pita. All worked except my pockets would close up overnight. I've come to the conclusion it came from cooking too long.
This worked great but my oven needed 475 setting. Still have pockets the next day.!
recipe can not open, please give me recipe
Is it necessary to bake on a baking stone?
No. You can use a baking sheet.
why so much science for a such a humble bread? my grandma could do this blind folded
You grandma probably did it for four decades. Baking is essentially chemistry. You can't save a bread dough once it's in the oven like you can with stew.
How do you store the pita so it doesn't get dry?
Who has room for a sheet pan in their fridge? Not me...
Should I not leave it to start to ferment on the counter? Thats what you're supposed to do with pizza
They look awesome but after all that those pitas should be able to make my coffee in the morning.
Of course but you may want to make yourself a cup of instant while you wait.
0:11 - 0:25 is unintentionally hilarious.
Even liquid ingredients should be measured by weight
I'm curious why that would be the case. I thought the problem that scales solve in the kitchen is that some dry ingredients have inconsistent densities. The particularly troublesome ingredients are flour and brown sugar. But there isn't that same problem with water, oil, and honey. Their densities are consistent enough that when measuring the same amount by volume, you will also be measuring the same amount by weight. Does measuring the liquid ingredients by weight solve some problem I'm missing?
@@paulhamilton7854 I measure everything by weight just fo consistency of thought, it’s easier for me to think in one measuring system. Also many bread recipes’ ingredients are based on a percentage of the weight of flour. So a dough recipe may call for 2% yeast which means whatever the total weight of flour the amount of yeast is two percent of that. I only brought it up in this case because she measured by weight very accurately for the water and flour but then measure by volume for the honey and oil.
@@charleshetrick3152 Thank you for the reply. I hadn't thought about recipes that work with percentages by weight. And now that you've pointed it out, I do wonder if that's why ounces were used to measure the flour instead of grams. I believe that for water, one volumetric ounce is (just about) equal to one fluid ounce, and if they wanted to use ounces as the measure for water, perhaps they wanted to use ounces for flour as well so one can calculate the percentages more easily. But that's just me speculating. Thanks again.
@@paulhamilton7854 It's easier. to combine ingredients if you are doing it by weight (grams better than ozs.). And also to scale the recipe.
$2500 of equipment to make a $0.25 piece of bread.
I want to try this but they won't let me access the recipe without getting a 'free trial'.
Good thing you can watch this video and get the recipe for free....
@@jabberman3000 you missed the point. In the show more box it says Get the recipe for Pita Bread: cooks.io/39hZus7 and yet you can't without giving them your information and signing up for a "free trial", therefore it's clickbait. No need to be snarky.
@@AuntDuddie you just want to complain. You can access the recipe for free.
It's not click bait. You can get the recipe via the link, you just don't want to sign up
Are these new episodes?
*13 days later*
... We have pita!
:-) I remember seeing a cooking episode on the TV where someone demonstarted something - cannot recall what it was - in Sous Vide and the other guest said something like "you have just shown me something made in (an enormous amount of) hours what I can make in 5 minutes".
I don't know ANYONE who uses ice water,,, or does a rise more than an hour... you can do it in a couple of hours... you can also do it on a flat skillet.
Can I replace the yeast
I get wonderful flatbread, but mine don't pop open
Recipe Note: "14 and 2/3 once" is translated 14.66/67 once.
44/3 ounces
Get with the (greatly superior) metric system! 416g flour, 310g water, 28g honey, 54g oil.
Can you make it whole wheat
14 and 2 third oz?
"It is easier to weigh " ..... FORTEEN AND TWO THIRD OUNCES. COME ON. Get metric.
I don't see your issue & why you feel the need for metric.
@@rmgtnsteele said the American
@@youtubehandol Don't worry, the metric system has fractions too.....you just refuse to admit that....you just express them as decimals....just as difficult if not more so
@@rmgtnsteele I haven't refused to admit anything.
415 grams. Isn't that fucken easy.
@@youtubehandol LOL of course. The show is American. Most viewers are American.
No Middle-Easterner makes pita bread like this. They do it in a matter of hours with no ice or fridge. Finally, way too much flour was used before rolling. This will result in a bitter after-taste because of the raw flour. There are other videos on YT to see how it's done without fuss and you get the pocket you're seeking.
middle easterners wouldn’t make pita at home they go to a bakery
The Arabs have the best bread
Giving weight in grams would be universally useful, hmmm?
For the next challenge, please make Lebanese saj bread. It really is the pinnacle of flat breads, along with Armenian lavash.
Way too long to chow time
What’s the point of weighing baking ingredients if you’re going to weigh everything in ounces? 🤦🏻♀️. There’s over 28 grams in one ounce! If you weigh everything in grams, you’ll be 100 % accurate every time you bake.
“It’s really important to weigh your ingredients” - proceeds to list out volume based measurements for all ingredients.
Can we please weigh in grams, not ounces?
When I bust out my scale, I feel like a flour dealer.
"As soon as yeast meets water fermentation begins." This is not true. If that were the case simply adding yeast to water would create alcohol, and as we all know there's a lot of yeast floating around in the air so streams, rivers, the ocean, and even rain would contain alcohol. What they meant to say was that as soon as yeast meets sugar in an appropriate liquid solution fermentation can begin. It's actually even more complicated than that, but that's the basic concept.
444 gm flour, 310 gm water.
Amazing. Pull two out of the oven... Let rest for ten minutes under a towel to multiple, and voilà.... You now have eight pitas.
Lol it's called editing
If you’re going to promote the weighing of ingredients then just weight them all including honey and oil, also makes the recipe globally usable (with a little conversion to grams)
I completely agree with this statement. And use grams, too..."14 2/3 oz"? No lol
my scale easily will switch between oz and grams but yeah I had to figure out the honey weight. It makes it so much easier to weigh an ingredient like honey. I figured 4 tsp is equal to 26.6g honey.
Who had ice in the Middle East when they made it?
Hello
As a child in Israel I watched old women bake pita on steel plates above a wood fire. This was in the 1950s.
Yeah, but Israel is also spoiled with good pita. Even supermarket pita here isn't so bad. It's nothing compared to home baked, but Israeli supermarket pita is so much better than American supermarket pita.
@@elliez.3561 near every major bus stop there is a bakery whose scent drives to buy pita, bread and pastry.
@@btbingo That's fair. There's a local bakery 5 minutes from my apartment that sells borekas, cookies, pitot, etc.
Iraqi or Druze style!
@@elliez.3561 You buy pita in the super?
Please, someone convert measurement units to ml, and cups ..
Is there a Turkish version of Uncle Roger to comment here?
And use martric system bread making
Does anyone have any good ice water recipes?
LMAO - In the Sep/Oct 2018 issue of "Cook's Illustrated" magazine where this came from, they actually DO... They say to use equal amounts of ice and water and let the mixture sit for 5 minutes. The goal is to get it to 35 degrees. It's on page 31 of the issue under the title "Why Colder Water Makes Better Dough".
Trying
Recommends a scale then uses ounces and spoons as measurements instead of grams and milliliters like a normal chef.
I lived in the US for many years... the pita was garbage, tough, inedible. In Israel, you get it fresh, in the morning... 10 in a nylon bag, still steaming... for about ₪12.90 = $3.96! The idea of keeping pita to the next day... crazy...
Palestine*
We all know this is an American presentation. But since YTb is international, and most bakers the-world-'round use metric, or, at very least, use decimal places rather than divisible fractions as actual scales do.
I'm actually American, and yet I am way over the whole ancient Amer-Brit means of weights and measures.
Maybe at least do the conversions and put them in notes below the video so everyone else in the world can easily get things right.
Thanks.
“Decrease water if not using KA flour…” Um, why? That statement makes no sense without explaining why.
brown hair lady so accurate in everything 🤓
You can weigh in ounces, milliliters, pounds or grams.
You lost me at ice water and yeast
I prefer two pockets in my pita...one for cash and one for credit cards.
😂😂😂😂
I'll tell my Hungry Hubby this one!!!!!!!!!!!!! 🥙🥙🥙
Ok. Where do you find a scale that measures 1/8 ounce????????
At your local head shop.
OXO Brand scales weigh in 1/8 oz increments.
@@kmariejs The current OXO model only does decimals.
@@husqvarna17 lmaoooo beat me to it!!